Abstract
AT the last meeting of the International Society of Soil Science it was decided to prepare a soil map of Asia, and the work of compiling the available materials was entrusted to a sub-commission headed by several of the leading Russian workers. This sub-commission has already published a number of contributions dealing with the soils of Japan, Manchuria and certain portions of China. A contribution by Dr. Z. J. Schokalsky, published by the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R.,Leningrad(1932), covers, in a similar way, the conditions in India. The materials which have been in the hands of the author are so carefully worked out that it is hard to believe that the map has been made by one who has never visited India. If it is open to criticism in certain directions, this is only because the materials placed before Dr. Schokalsky have been unsatisfactory and imperfect. It must, however, be recognised that the references cited in the present contribution are far from complete and in a number of cases do not include the best materials available. Thus, for example, in connexion with the soils of north-east India, the whole of the admirable work done by the Bxperts of the Indian Tea Association is omitted, though their studies are probably the best that have been done over a large area of Assam and Bengal. Again, probably the best information about actual soil conditions and their distribution in peninsular India will be found in the various survey and settlement reports, much of which is summarised in the “Gazetteers” issued more than a generation ago, and these do not appear to have been consulted. A very large area in the north-east of the Peninsula, which forms perhaps the largest forest tract still existing in the country, is marked on the map as consisting of steppe soils. Even with regard to the black cotton soil, or regur, the account given takes no account of the radically different types of the soil in the northern and the southern parts of the black soil area. Before the present map is finally issued as an authoritative account of Indian soils, it will have to be subjected to very careful constructive criticism.
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Natural Conditions of Soil Formation in India. Nature 133, 681 (1934). https://doi.org/10.1038/133681b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/133681b0